A report released by the Environmental Working Group (EWG)
and U.S. Public Interest Research Group (U.S. PIRG) has taken aim at
chlorination byproducts (CBPs) in tap water. The group‘s assessment
states that more than 100,000 women are at elevated risk of miscarriage or
birth defects because of CBPs in tap water.
The report, “Consider the Source,” seems to
blame EPA and Congress for failing to clean up rivers and reservoirs and
therefore, forcing water utilities to chlorinate water. “Until Congress
and the EPA act to limit pollution from farms and urban runoff so that water
entering drinking water treatment plants is much cleaner than it is today, CBPs
will remain at unacceptably high levels,” stated the report.
The report estimates that from 1996 through 2001, more than
16 million people in 1,258 communities were served water contaminated with CBPs
for at least 12 months at levels higher than a new legal limit the went into
effect January 1. The highest levels of CBPs were reported by small rural
drinking water utilities.
Many water groups were quick to respond to the study. The
USEPA stated that current disinfection byproduct (DBP) standards “provide
the safest balance between the need to disinfect drinking water while providing
a healthy margin of safety to all, including our most vulnerable
citizens.”
The New Jersey Section of the American Water Works
Association (NJAWWA) stated that it recognized the need to clean up source
waters and “are working to meet not only the new disinfection byproduct
rules but also the new standards on the horizon.”
C.T. Howlett, Jr., executive director of the Chlorine
Chemistry Council, added that for more than 100 years, chlorine has been added
to drinking water to destroy disease-causing bacteria and viruses. As a result,
waterborne diseases have essentially been eliminated in the U.S. They also
cited the World Health Organization‘s findings that “risks to
health from DBPs are extremely small in comparison with inadequate
disinfection.”
The report does not offer solutions. It does call for the
immediate clean up of lakes and
rivers that provide tap water by reducing the soil erosion and the nutrient and
animal waste runoff from farms that increase the need for chlorination. According
to the report, the Farm Bill currently being debated in Congress is an
opportunity to fund farmland conservation programs that could protect
waterways, curb sprawl and clean up America’s tap water.
EWG and U.S. PIRG also recommended the creation of a
nationwide health-tracking network, coordinated by the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention. Citing the lack of reliable data on environmentally
caused disease, the network would monitor American's exposure to pollution and
would track birth defects, miscarriages and other diseases linked to pollution.
However, all parties agree with the need for cleaner source
water to help prevent the precursors that contribute to the formation of
disinfection byproducts. “We all need to work in a cooperative spirit
between dischargers, regulators and environmentalists in a concerted effort to
clean up our waterways and reduce disinfection byproduct precursors,”
stated the NJAWWA.
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